Law & Disorder —

Two cyberbullying bills duke it out in House committee

The House Judiciary Committee listened to testimonies this week that argued …

Cyberbullying is a delicate subject that is better met with education than with laws to criminalize it, testimony before the House Judiciary Committee suggested yesterday. Most experts testifying at the hearing agreed that criminalization would be difficult—both from an enforcement standpoint and also Constitutionally—while education would offer a better approach to some of the nuances of cyberbullying.

The two bills discussed at the Committee hearing were Representative Linda Sanchez's (D-CA) "Megan Meier Cyber Bullying Prevention Act" and Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz's (D-FL) "Adolescent Web Awareness Requires Education Act" (H.R. 1966 and H.R. 3630, respectively). Given the name of the Sanchez bill, it's clear that it was created in memory of the "MySpace suicide" case of 13-year-old Megan Meier, who was repeatedly manipulated and harassed online by the mother of a peer until she eventually killed herself.

The bill was introduced in April in an attempt to criminalize such behavior, but critics immediately zeroed in on the vagueness of the bill's language and noted that it could be easily abused to prosecute a wide array of free speech situations. That was once again the focus among critics of the bill in Wednesday's hearing—civil rights attorney Harvey Silverglate pointed out that no citizen (or even the average lawyer or judge) would be able to understand exactly what the bill means when it comes to verbal harassment as a criminal offense. "Often born of good intentions, these legislative efforts have, almost without fail, produced unintended consequences," Silverglate said, "including excessive and unfair prosecutions as well as the inhibition of the sometimes unruly verbal interactions that are, and should be, the product of a free society."

Schultz's AWARE Act, on the other hand, aims to dedicate $125 million in grants per year to develop Internet crime awareness and cybercrime prevention programs. This involves educating parents and children on how to protect themselves, support prevention initiatives, and develop public education campaigns to promote awareness of Internet crimes against children. Harvard Law Professor John Palfrey praised the AWARE Act, calling it a "terrific proposal" that could benefit young Internet users by building an infrastructure of support between doctors, social workers, and the kids themselves.

Despite some disagreement from others about how such funds should be distributed and who should do the distributing, the general consensus among child safety experts was that teaching kids how to deal with cyberbullying firsthand was preferable to trying (and undoubtedly failing) to protect them from it. Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use director Nancy Willard quoted Richard Thornburgh in her testimony, noting that "it is impossible to effectively teach all young people to swim if their parents and teachers only know how to paddle in the shallow part of the pool or are afraid to get wet."

It's clear that these two bills take almost completely opposite approaches to dealing with online bullying and harassment, and there are few who work in law or child services seems to favor the Megan Meier bill. That didn't stop Sanchez from pleading for the children during the hearing—"I want to acknowledge how difficult it will be to craft a prohibition on cyberbullying that is consistent with the Constitution. But I also believe that working together for our children, we can and must do so."

Further reading:

Jacqui Cheng
Jacqui is an Editor at Large at Ars Technica, where she has spent the last eight years writing about Apple culture, gadgets, social networking, privacy, and more. Emailjacqui@arstechnica.com//Twitter@eJacqui

I'm unclear to me how "awareness" can alleviate the problem, or how it might have prevented the cited suicide. So, a teen could talk to their doctor or guidance counselor about it? How is that different than today? More importantly, how would that make the bullying stop? Do you think a bully is going to stop being a bully because of a poster in the cafeteria or a "cyberbullying is BAD" lecture?

I get the challenges of crafting very specific bill to criminalize it, but I don't see how any of the proposals in the AWARE bill would have any meaningful effect. I remain open to the idea, but unconvinced.

Schultz's AWARE Act, on the other hand, aims to dedicate $125 million in grants per year to develop Internet crime awareness and cybercrime prevention programs. This involves educating parents and children on how to protect themselves, support prevention initiatives, and develop public education campaigns to promote awareness of Internet crimes against children.

Wow, what an ingenious way of thinking, lets teach people how to think for themselves and be pro-active.

quote:

That didn't stop Sanchez from pleading for the children during the hearing—"I want to acknowledge how difficult it will be to craft a prohibition on cyberbullying that is consistent with the Constitution. But I also believe that working together for our children, we can and must do so."

I thought the AWARE Act was the better of the two before I even read the above quote, but reading it only further solidified my stance.

It seems like the parents of the "My Space Suicide" are almost as much to blame as the adult woman who was the harasser. These people would rather avoid and deflect these problems onto other people or the government than actually taking an interest in what your kid is doing. I am sure that if you payed even an ounce interest in what your kid was doing that they would be able to tell immediatly that they were severly upset with what they had been reading online.

The solution?A. Cut them off from the hateB. Educate them about the hateC. Remove the source of the hate

The Soccor Mom Solution...A. Bubble wrap kids B. Legislate parenting

When I was a kid, a scraped knee warrented a "walk it off"

Todays scraped knee warrents the hospital and a government petition for safer sidewalks....

Whatever happend to "sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me"?

It can't hurt, but I don't think the AWARE Act will do much. For me, any bill would have to make prevention it's primary purpose. All the support, outreach, etc. is reactionary, and by then the harm has already been done. Plus, there's a lot of language about "protection." How, exactly, would a teenager "protect" themself from a determined cyberbully who created a fake Facebook page in their name?

I just read the AWARE bill, and they don't even know HOW to do the prevention stuff. It specifically talks about hiring private companies, within six months of the bill's passage, to do research on what educational tools/methods MIGHT be efficacious at prevention. So the reality is that other than posters and feel-good marketing materials, this bill wouldn't actually actively prevent cybercrimes for at least a year.

I guess I'd favor some sort of combination of the two approaches. For me, it comes down to - would you rather have a poster in the school that says "Cyberbullying is LAME !!!! Just don't do it, K? LOLZ" or one that says "If you are a cyberbully, you will face ___ punishment." This is an oversimplification, but I think I know which would be more effective in the short run.

How can an anti-bullying law not curtail free speech? How do you legally define what it is to verbally "bully" someone? We already have laws against threats of violence, should we really go further to outlaw being mean? How many people would NOT be criminals under such a law?

It seems like a gross violation of human rights and can't possibly be constitutional under the first amendment.

Originally posted by marmot_1:It can't hurt, but I don't think the AWARE Act will do much. For me, any bill would have to make prevention it's primary purpose. All the support, outreach, etc. is reactionary, and by then the harm has already been done. Plus, there's a lot of language about "protection." How, exactly, would a teenager "protect" themself from a determined cyberbully who created a fake Facebook page in their name?

To me, your example represents more of a cyber identity theft than bullying. I would be more willing to support legislation that prevents someone impersonating someone else than limiting what you can and cannot say on the internet(bullying).

Neither of these bills are worth a shit and that is fine. I have a better solution. Grow a thicker fucking skin and a bit of common sense. First off who cares what a fucking screen name has to say. I don't particularly approve of shopping for women on myspace, but if I did it, she would be a screen name and nothing more until such time that I was balls deep inside her in the really real world. Until that point (and most likely after as well) her opinion of me would be irrelevant.

I am so sick of this bubblewrap the kids mentality the world has. These poor kids are growing up to be total pussies, and when they end up with a supervisor that is a dick they are going to end up crying at work, and making a total pansy of themselves. Can we please start raising our kids to have a fucking spine and stand up for themselves?

People go on about free speech, but I think our founding fathers (if you read alot of what they wrote) believed that the only way you really could have freedom was by being responsible for your actions and active in your community and government. People seem to want the freedom to be complete asshats, but don't want to be responsible for it. These laws are proposed because of a perceived need for them, they don't (most of the time) just show up out of nowhere. If people stop abusing their freedoms, government won't have an excuse to pass stupid overreaching legislation like this. Society's impulse control is at an all time low (especially on the internet) so I really don't think personal responsibility is going to be the solution. Guess we'll have to legislate! :P

Originally posted by Daveosis:People go on about free speech, but I think our founding fathers (if you read alot of what they wrote) believed that the only way you really could have freedom was by being responsible for your actions and active in your community and government. People seem to want the freedom to be complete asshats, but don't want to be responsible for it. These laws are proposed because of a perceived need for them, they don't (most of the time) just show up out of nowhere. If people stop abusing their freedoms, government won't have an excuse to pass stupid overreaching legislation like this. Society's impulse control is at an all time low (especially on the internet) so I really don't think personal responsibility is going to be the solution. Guess we'll have to legislate! :P

The only perceived need in congress is to appease the whiny soccer moms, and the yuppies who are afraid someone is going to hurt their feelings online. And why would the great men and women of congress do this you ask? To get reelected. That's right kids, the only reason they are pushing these shitty laws is to get reelected.

Originally posted by Demondeluxe:The only perceived need in congress is to appease the whiny soccer moms, and the yuppies who are afraid someone is going to hurt their feelings online. And why would the great men and women of congress do this you ask? To get reelected. That's right kids, the only reason they are pushing these shitty laws is to get reelected.

A girl committed suicide. There were other factors, probably more than the we will ever know from media reports, but vicious, intentional harm was inflicted. I'm not talking about a playground scuffle or yo mama jokes, I'm talking about psyche-damaging, potentially life-altering abuse that may be criminal in real life, just visited via the web. I kinda agree with you, but you're not seeming to make allowances for the extreme cases.

Originally posted by Demondeluxe:The only perceived need in congress is to appease the whiny soccer moms, and the yuppies who are afraid someone is going to hurt their feelings online. And why would the great men and women of congress do this you ask? To get reelected. That's right kids, the only reason they are pushing these shitty laws is to get reelected.

A girl committed suicide. There were other factors, probably more than the we will ever know from media reports, but vicious, intentional harm was inflicted. I'm not talking about a playground scuffle or yo mama jokes, I'm talking about psyche-damaging, potentially life-altering abuse that may be criminal in real life, just visited via the web. I kinda agree with you, but you're not seeming to make allowances for the extreme cases.

Extreme cases? The girl had known mental illnesses, and from the sound of it her home life was far from perfect. Her parents apparently had no problem with her playing around on myspace despite iirc you are supposed to be 16 to have a profile. There are any multitude of things that could have set this girl off, it just happened to be a fucked up internet prank. There is no reason at all to try to sanitize the internet over this shit. I mean a mentally ill girl killed herself? Who would have guessed that.

Originally posted by Demondeluxe:The only perceived need in congress is to appease the whiny soccer moms, and the yuppies who are afraid someone is going to hurt their feelings online. And why would the great men and women of congress do this you ask? To get reelected. That's right kids, the only reason they are pushing these shitty laws is to get reelected.

A girl committed suicide. There were other factors, probably more than the we will ever know from media reports, but vicious, intentional harm was inflicted. I'm not talking about a playground scuffle or yo mama jokes, I'm talking about psyche-damaging, potentially life-altering abuse that may be criminal in real life, just visited via the web. I kinda agree with you, but you're not seeming to make allowances for the extreme cases.

I agree with you up to your characterization of that event as an "internet prank." Regardless of her mental state or her horrible parents, it was way beyond a prank.

Don't try to make this about something it's not. I don't want to sanitize the internet, I want disincentives - and failing that, harsh punishement - for the thirteen year-old asshat who decides to make a pet project out of ruining my kid's social life and academic career.

I can apply some pressure of my own, but having the law on my side helps. Doesn't have to be this proposed new law if there are already ones on the books. I just think you're applying your experiences on today's kids, and too much has changed for that to work.

Don't try to make this about something it's not. I don't want to sanitize the internet, I want disincentives - and failing that, harsh punishement - for the thirteen year-old asshat who decides to make a pet project out of ruining my kid's social life and academic career.

Please, the parenting was pretty awful in this case, and the treatment of her known and obvious psychological issues was even worse.

People are assholes on the internet. If kids can't handle that, they shouldn't *be* on the Internet. End of story. It's not really bullying when you can make it go away by turning off the monitor.

In my example, I'm talking about something that doesn't go away when you turn off the monitor. If that's all it was, I could see your point of view. I'm talking about rumors, slanders, horrifically rude insults, etc. posted in a place online such that it carries over into the hallways of the school, making a kid a pariah for no reason other than someone decided to ruin them. If there are already laws that cover such things, fine, but don't tell me that in that hypothetical situation I should have to be the one to change my behavior (i.e., curtail my family's use of the internet).

Originally posted by marmot_1:In my example, I'm talking about something that doesn't go away when you turn off the monitor. If that's all it was, I could see your point of view. I'm talking about rumors, slanders, horrifically rude insults, etc. posted in a place online such that it carries over into the hallways of the school, making a kid a pariah for no reason other than someone decided to ruin them. If there are already laws that cover such things, fine, but don't tell me that in that hypothetical situation I should have to be the one to change my behavior (i.e., curtail my family's use of the internet).

I can see your point, it would be pretty brutal to be "that kid". I guess the reason I most most against this type of law is that it could be used to basically censor "all people" who use the internet, not just to protect kids.

From the Article

quote:

...critics immediately zeroed in on the vagueness of the bill's language and noted that it could be easily abused to prosecute a wide array of free speech situations

Perhaps if it was specific enough to only cover extreme situations and could not be extended to include anything else in a court of law I may agree with something like that. Honestly though, I just don't see it happening.

*Its well worth to note that children are not granted the same range of freedoms that adults are. Freedom of speech...I am not sure it is one of them.

Originally posted by TehGod?:We wouldn't have to worry about cyberbullying if people weren't so cybersensitive. Honestly, I own forums and I'll be damned if I let these bills tell me what I can have and cant have said on them.

Forums are one thing, and I wholeheartedly agree with you. However, what about impersonating someone on a social networking site (e.g., Facebook/MySpace/Twitter) and/or by creating misleading email accounts? What about using those accounts to make sexist/racist comments or to create a false impression about the person?

When you work in IT in education, you want students to have as much freedom as their particular age allows (which can be a real balancing act when trying to provide K-12 services). However, preventing abuse of a system is a big deal, as is promoting personal responsibility among students. And (let's face it) liability is a concern as well, whether we'd like it to be or not. To point out:

quote:

When I was a kid, a bully warranted a "punch in the mouth"

When you and I were kids, the parents of a bully wouldn't threaten to get a lawyer involved and sue. Unfortunately, the game has changed. Bullying kids often have bullying parents, who do their darnedest to make sure their child doesn't have to take responsibility for their actions, whether the consequences be a punch in the mouth, or a trip to the principal's office. Also note that not every kid is large enough to fight back.

quote:

Whatever happend to "sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me"?

What happened is that we realized that the people who made up that phrase didn't get it --they never experienced repetetive hurtful words over years and years of K-12 education.

As someone who was severly picked on throughout middle school I certainly understand the desire to do something about bullying. However, there is no new threat here. All that's different is that cyberbullying often leaves behind a record that lets adults see just how awful kids can be to each other. It's not like kids don't use telephones to say mean things to each other. As long as you let kids socially interact with each other some of them will be mean.

No legal threat will stop this since we aren't willing to throw millions of suburban kids into jail for bullying classmates. Almost everyone engages in a small measure of this type of activity, indeed, there is a strong pressure on those being picked on to pick on someone else and thereby increase their social standing. So it's inevitable that kids will still see their classmates engaging in all sorts of bullying and hurtful speech online without consequence and, as is the nature of teens, will assume they can get away with it to. All a law against cyberbullying would do is let the government punish the tormentors who are unlucky enough that their target commits suicide which, as much as I hate bullies, hardly seems desirable.

The government grants to fund anti-bullying efforts are almost as bad. They may not imperil free speech but they are worse than a waste of money. As anyone who has been seriously picked on will attest ineffectual lectures by authority figures admonishing kids against bullying often make the problem worse. Just as DARE programs have been shown to increase teen drug usage this can make bullying more appealing. More significantly it conveys the message to kids that the authorities have no effective means of controlling/punishing this behavior (we don't have classes asking people not to cheat/murder/etc..). This will mean some stupid assembly every year where the kids are told about the dangers of bullying while the snicker and pick on each other more.

If you want to do something about bullying you need to first accept that it's a natural behavior of kids/teens when left to their own devices. If you divide up kids by age and encourage their social groups to be of the same age then this is an inevitable consequence. On the other hand you get a lot less bullying when the line between children and adults is not so firmly fixed and kids socialize in family groups as well as with their peers. In other words your older brother, dad or mom isn't going to let you get away with being a dick and will provide an example of not behaving like that. So back to the way we did things before the modern era.

When you and I were kids, the parents of a bully wouldn't threaten to get a lawyer involved and sue. Unfortunately, the game has changed. Bullying kids often have bullying parents, who do their darnedest to make sure their child doesn't have to take responsibility for their actions, whether the consequences be a punch in the mouth, or a trip to the principal's office.

I don't disagree, which is why my initial post in this thread was:

quote:

Originally posted by Jackattak:

It all starts at home, as well. Monkey see, monkey do and all that mess.

quote:

Originally posted by L0neW0lf:Also note that not every kid is large enough to fight back.

Don't even get me started on this one. I was a small kid and got picked on lots, so I'm speaking from experience here...It takes one...JUST ONE sock to the nose of the bully to end this type of shit.

Will you go to the principal's office? Yes. But it's worth it.

Point being, when everybody's a kid in school, there is no "little guy." You're all little. It doesn't take much at all to do real damage to each other, so it has nothing to do with being small. Just knock the ever-loving shit out of the guy and walk away.

*Disclaimer: If this doesn't work for your kid, next time tell him to use his textbook.

Everyone here seems to be living up the "back in my day" dream. As politely as I can say it, get your head out of your ass. The problem is not of one child bullying another, it is of an adult impersonating a child to bully another child. You see, the internet makes it so easy. In real life, it would be darn near impossible to do what that mom did to Meier.

Adults are not allowed to push children around in real-life. There are strict laws for that. Why should it not be the same on the internet? And before people start off with "Why do kids need to be on the internet.. I was never on the internet," the world has changed a little bit. For children today, their virtual self is now an integral part of their life. If anything, they are being exposed to it sooner each passing year. It's cool to be the first one on MySpace or Facebook. It's always the case with new territory, whoever stakes out a claim first is the coolest. It's important to remember that these games are fine among children themselves, but when an adult enters the picture, the balance of power is very skewed.

Granted the laws being proposed are too vague; perhaps the language should become more specific. One solution is to attach harsh penalties for impersonation of a minor online. No adult should ever foresee a need to do so for above-board activities. If someone can think of a perfectly legitimate online activity where impersonating a 12-year old is not only okay, but necessary, I'll be glad to hear from them.

Maybe I just suffer from some paranoia, but when I was younger i assumed that every teenage girl on the internet was at worst a 40-50 year old kid toucher. There was no way in hell I was gonna get all gaga like this meier chick did, over some smooth talking screen name. as I said.

quote:

Originally posted by Demondeluxe:First off who cares what a fucking screen name has to say. I don't particularly approve of shopping for women on myspace, but if I did it, she would be a screen name and nothing more until such time that I was balls deep inside her in the really real world. Until that point (and most likely after as well) her opinion of me would be irrelevant.

It might do parents some good to restrict, monitor, or educate their crotch droppings about the internet.

Every woman on the internet is a dudeEvery dude on the internet is a kidEvery kid on the internet is Chris Hanson

I mean the girls first stupid assumption was the "guy" on myspace was actually who he says he is. Second stupid assumption was that the "guy" on the internet actually cared about her.

So as best I can tell she was pretty stupid, which is not a very desirable survival trait, and for the sake of the species makes her a poor choice for breeding. Her parents were either to apathetic to do anything or also stupid. Now given that stupid people produce little stupid people we can guess that her parents would need to be stupid in order for her to come out that way. She is, and give the nature of her behavior I would imagine they are as well.

While the chick that made the profile and all that jazz certainly showed a lack of judgment and a certain knack from unwarranted cruelty. I think given most likely the already mentally unstable girl would have killed herself eventually anyway, maybe when the guy the would have punched her V Card decided to leave her to bone a more attractive woman. Are we going to write a bunch of piss ass dating laws to stop cheating and selfish break ups? I certainly fucking hope not. Better parenting, smarter kids, and not raising your kids and sad whiny little pussies will solve this problem way better than a bunch of bullshit laws and it will frankly help to improve society as a whole.

zelannii - No adult should ever foresee a need to do so for above-board activities. If someone can think of a perfectly legitimate online activity where impersonating a 12-year old is not only okay, but necessary, I'll be glad to hear from them.

Some people think this is a necessary tool to catch pedobear.

@Demondeluxe

In spite of your rather blase attitude about this and the subsequent consequences, it was my understanding that the mother was pretending to be a boy who actually wne to school with this girl and was someone she knew...not some pretend guy who existed only in her sad little fantasy world. ODFO